1. Technical Field
Embodiments generally relate to software applications.
2. Background Art
Historically, businesses were most concerned about adequate storage, retrieval, and analysis of data. Today, businesses operate in environments where having the ability to monitor and respond to changing events has become increasingly important.
Event-driven systems typically have been built around relational databases, real-time messaging systems, or a combination of both. While these technologies have their advantages, neither is particularly well suited for managing and analyzing events in rapidly changing environments.
For example, relational databases process large amounts of data and analyze information with relative ease. However, relational databases are not designed to operate in real-time environments and do not provide effective ways of monitoring rapidly changing data. Messaging systems offer real-time data monitoring, but generally are not capable of providing complex computations, correlations, pattern matching or referencing of historical data.
Custom applications must be integrated with these technologies to create viable solutions. However, relying on such applications to compensate for technological limitations creates new challenges. For example, custom applications are complex, costly to build and modify, and do not scale well as organizational needs change.